Ocarina of Time Heart Pieces Guide (All 36 & 20 Hearts)

Twenty hearts is the ceiling in Ocarina of Time, and unlike the Gold Skulltula grind — where the last real prize is the Piece of Heart at token 50 and the 100th token just pays out a 200-Rupee Huge Rupee — the heart economy is honest all the way to the top. Every single Piece of Heart is worth exactly a quarter of a heart, from the first one to the thirty-sixth. No dead zone, no troll payout at the end.

That makes this the one OoT collectible actually worth finishing. Here is the full breakdown: the math, where the 36 pieces cluster, the two that look like slot machines but are not, and the endgame upgrade that is worth more than any four pieces you will ever find.

The heart math nobody spells out

Link starts a new file with 3 hearts and tops out at 20. That gap of 17 hearts is filled from exactly two sources:

• 8 Heart Containers dropped whole by bosses.
• 9 Heart Containers assembled from 36 Pieces of Heart, at 4 pieces per container.

3 + 8 + 9 = 20. That is the entire system. If your Life Gauge is short and you cannot work out why, count backwards from that equation and you will find the hole.

The part worth sitting with: the 36 scattered pieces are collectively worth more than every boss in the game combined. Nine hearts from sidequests, eight from the entire dungeon crawl. If you clear all eight temples and skip the overworld, you finish the game at 11 hearts and wonder why Ganondorf hits so hard.

The eight boss Heart Containers

One Heart Container per boss, eight bosses:

Ganondorf and Ganon give you nothing but the credits. And here is a detail most players never register: Ocarina of Time is where boss Heart Containers go back to being optional pickups — the container sits in the room waiting for you, but nothing forces you to touch it before you step into the blue warp. Just grab it.

If any of these eight are giving you trouble, the full boss guide covers the patterns, and the dungeon order guide explains where each fight sits in the route.

All 36 Pieces of Heart, by region

Pieces are not spread evenly. They bunch hard around Kakariko and the water regions, and thin out almost to nothing in the forest. Here is how they stack up, counted from the Ocarina of Time Randomizer's location list:

That is all 36. The list also carries a Master Quest copy of the Ice Cavern piece and a fortress piece it marks out of logic; neither is one of the 36 in a normal playthrough. The practical read: eight of the 36 are inside Kakariko's borders, which is more than a fifth of the total in one village and its graveyard. If you are behind on pieces, start there.

Kakariko Village and the Graveyard

The village side includes the Piece of Heart hanging on the upper ledge inside the Kakariko Windmill. You can reach it by entering the windmill from Dampe's grave and riding the moving platforms up, or you can skip the platforming entirely and yank it down with the Boomerang. Kakariko also holds the 50-token payout from the House of Skulltula, which is a Piece of Heart — one more reason to treat the Gold Skulltula hunt as a heart-piece source, not just a wallet source.

The graveyard is denser than it looks. Dampé's Heart-Pounding Gravedigging Tour pays a Piece of Heart as its first grand prize (how that works is below, and in full in our Kakariko Graveyard guide). Re-running his race after you have already claimed the Hookshot and finishing in under a minute pays out another (miss the minute and you get a Red Rupee instead — the game is not subtle about the difference). A soft soil patch in the graveyard, planted as a child, grows into a leaf that carries adult Link to a ledge with a crate hiding a third. The fourth is in a chest inside a pulled-back grave in the back row: per Thonky, play Sun's Song to freeze the ReDead, stand on the platform, and play it again to reveal the chest.

Lake Hylia and the Fishing Pond

Lake Hylia's three revolve around water and the Lakeside Laboratory. The scientist inside watches you dive and calls out your depth in meters; dive to the bottom of his pool with the Golden Scale and he hands over a Piece of Heart for the effort. Outside, a soft soil patch grows a bean stalk to the lab roof, where a ladder leads to a small overlook platform holding another. The Scarecrow's Song gets you up there too if you never planted the bean.

The Fishing Pond on the lake's small island is the third, and it is era-split in a way that catches people: beat the standing record with a fish of about 9 pounds or more as a child and you receive a Piece of Heart, while an adult needs about 13 pounds and receives the Golden Scale instead (the decompiled code sets those thresholds at 50 and 60 in fish length, once per age). Use the Sinking Lure and the owner will happily log your catch and then refuse to pay you.

Death Mountain Trail and Crater

Three pieces on the mountain, and both of the ones I would flag are bean-gated. The soft soil near the entrance to Dodongo's Cavern on Death Mountain Trail grows into a leaf that lifts you to a small hill with a Piece of Heart on it — and doubles as a shortcut to the top of the mountain. Up in Death Mountain Crater, the patch near the warp platform carries you to the top of one of the two rock formations, where another one waits. The Crater holds two in total.

Gerudo Valley, the Fortress, and the Colossus

Gerudo Valley has two, and they are the most "old Zelda" pieces in the game. One sits inside a box on a small ledge across the river, reachable by grabbing a Cucco and gliding over. The other is behind the waterfall, up a ladder onto a ledge. Per Thonky, glide there with a Cucco or drop to the ledge beside the river and jump behind the falls. Miss the platform and the current sweeps you all the way down to Lake Hylia near the scientist's lab.

Gerudo's Fortress holds two. One is in a treasure chest at the very top of the structure, and getting it is a genuine flex: play the Scarecrow's Song to summon Pierre, then Hookshot to him. Pierre is not Bonooru. Per Zelda Wiki, Bonooru is the Lake Hylia scarecrow you teach the melody to, and he lends you his friend Pierre, who springs out of the ground when you play it. Thonky's heart-piece list adds that the Longshot reaches the chest too. The other piece is the Horseback Archery prize: score 1,000 points on Epona at the range behind the fortress, as our Epona guide explains. The Gerudo's Fortress guide covers the roof routes.

There is a single piece out at the Desert Colossus as well, on top of the rock arch in front of the Spirit Temple. Per Thonky, you reach it with a Magic Bean planted there as a child.

Zora country and the Ice Cavern

Zora's River, on the way to the Domain, holds four. Two come from the frogs on the log, both as a child: play them the Song of Storms for one, then, after you have played them all your non-warp songs, win their bug-catching game for the other. The other two sit out in the open, per Thonky: one on a pillar near the river's open grotto, which a child reaches by carrying the Cucco from the river's entrance up the angled ramp and gliding to the ledge, and one on a platform near the waterfall entrance to Zora's Domain, reachable with a Cucco or the Hover Boots. Our Zora's River guide has the frogs' tune and both routes.

Zora's Fountain has two, and one of them is a classic gear check — sink to the bottom of the fountain wearing the Zora Tunic with the Iron Boots and it is sitting there. Zora's Domain contributes one more, and the Ice Cavern holds a single Piece of Heart along with three Gold Skulltula Tokens.

Hyrule Field, Lon Lon Ranch, and the Lost Woods

Hyrule Field's two include the single funniest deal in the game: a Business Scrub inside a secret grotto near the Lake Hylia entrance will sell you a Piece of Heart for 10 Rupees. Ten. A quarter of a heart for the price of a green Rupee and change.

Lon Lon Ranch hides one in the storage tower directly behind the paddock, sharing the space with two cows. The Lost Woods holds two more, on top of the Deku Stick and Deku Nut capacity upgrades scattered through the same maze.

Hyrule Castle Town

The Market holds three, and two of them cost money instead of exploration. The Treasure Chest Game takes 10 Rupees once: per the decompiled N64 code, that one payment buys the first door's key and covers the whole run, not a pull per room. Each of the first five rooms has two chests, one holding the key to the next door and one holding Rupees of escalating colour — green, green, blue, blue, red. The gold sixth room holds a single chest with a Piece of Heart inside; take it once and every future clear pays a Purple Rupee (50) instead. The Bombchu Bowling Alley is 30 Rupees a game with a five-prize wheel that includes a Piece of Heart and a Bomb Bag upgrade.

The third piece is free. At night, child Link can bring Richard, the Pooch Lady's lost dog, home. Thonky puts him by the empty stall in the corner of the Market near the town entrance, a white dog that follows you once you walk up to him; lead him into the Back Alley and through her door. Per Zelda Wiki, she pays a Piece of Heart the first time. Our Castle Town Market guide has the dog's route, the Treasure Chest Game odds and the bowling wheel in full.

The two pieces that look like RNG

Most of the 36 come down to finding the spot and doing the thing. Two look like slot machines: Bombchu Bowling and Dampé's Gravedigging Tour. The decompiled N64 code says neither is the open-ended gamble it appears to be. (The Market's Treasure Chest Game is the real coin flip: the code picks which of each room's two chests holds the key at random, 50/50, when you walk in. Thonky's fix is the Lens of Truth.)

• Bombchu Bowling. It is 30 Rupees a game, and the operator only reveals the prize after you pay. But the prizes come round a fixed wheel of five: Bomb Bag upgrade (a Purple Rupee once won), Purple Rupee, 10 Bombchus, Piece of Heart (a Purple Rupee once won), one Bomb. The only random part is where the wheel starts, rolled once when the alley loads, and every paid game moves it one step, win or lose. So the heart is the prize in one of your first five games, and if the counter shows 10 Bombchus, the next game is for the heart. Leave the alley and the start is rolled again.
• The Gravedigging Tour. Dampé charges 10 Rupees a dig and digs the patch he is standing next to, so you cannot point him at a plot. Which patch it is does not change the prize. Each good dig rolls a Green Rupee (40%), Blue Rupee (30%), Red Rupee (20%) or the grand prize (10%), which is the Piece of Heart the first time. Each prize is capped at 8, 4, 2 and 1 per 15 good digs, so the heart comes up by the 15th good dig at the latest, as long as you stay in the graveyard. A dig turns up nothing only when he is not at a dig spot, or is at the one he just dug. On N64, Zelda Wiki warns, the heart is gone for good if you leave without picking it up.

Neither is hard, but both cost Rupees, so it is worth taking the House of Skulltula's wallet upgrades first so you are not broke halfway through.

Double Defense beats any four pieces

Here is the upgrade that reframes the whole hunt. Deep in a hidden cave beside Ganon's Castle lives the Great Fairy of Courage, and she grants Double Defense: every hit you take is halved.

Run the numbers. Four Pieces of Heart buy you one extra heart, a 5% bump on a 20-heart bar. Double Defense doubles the effective value of the entire bar — a 20-heart file with it survives what a 40-heart file would survive without. Nothing else in the game comes close.

The catch is brutal by design. The entrance is sealed behind a granite pillar that only the Golden Gauntlets can shift, and the Golden Gauntlets are found inside Ganon's Castle itself. You unlock the best defensive upgrade in Ocarina of Time right at the end of the game.

For completeness, the other five Great Fairy Fountains, all summoned by playing Zelda's Lullaby on the Triforce crest:

• Din's Fire — near Hyrule Castle. As a child, bomb the boulder at the end of the side path with a sign reading "Dead End."
• Farore's Wind — Zora's Fountain.
• Nayru's Love — Desert Colossus.
• Magic Meter and the Magic Spin Attack — the Great Fairy of Power on Death Mountain Trail.
• Enhanced Magic Meter — the Great Fairy of Wisdom in Death Mountain Crater.

The gating that makes people miss pieces

Most missed pieces are not hidden. They are locked behind a tool or a timeline you did not think about.

Magic Beans are the big one. Soft soil only exists in the child era, so a bean can only ever be planted as a child. Seven years later that sprout is a climbable leaf. Beans start at 10 Rupees from the Bean Seller by Zora's River and the price climbs by 10 with every purchase, so buying all of them late is a real expense. Miss the planting window entirely and you are relying on the Scarecrow's Song to reach those ledges instead.

The Golden Scale gates the deep-water pieces. Link's unassisted dive is a pathetic three seconds and three metres. Clearing the Diving Game in Zora's Domain — collect every blue Rupee underwater before the timer dies — earns the Silver Scale, which takes you to six metres and is required to get inside Jabu-Jabu's Belly at all. It is the Golden Scale, won at the Fishing Pond as an adult, that gets you to the bottom of the scientist's pool for his Piece of Heart (per Thonky, the Golden Scale or the Iron Boots also reach the piece at the bottom of the water in the Hyrule Field grotto west of the Market).

Iron Boots and the Zora Tunic are the gate on Zora's Fountain's floor piece. The Iron Boots are in the Ice Cavern and the tunic costs 300 Rupees in Zora's Domain, both of which you want anyway before the Water Temple.

N64, 3DS, and Master Quest

Master Quest on GameCube rebuilds every dungeon layout, redistributes enemies, throws mini-bosses at you far earlier, moves several in-dungeon Gold Skulltula locations, and makes items that were optional in the original mandatory. Heart pieces move too — the Ice Cavern's piece was relocated to the other Blue Fire room.

Master Quest in Ocarina of Time 3D is a different animal. It only unlocks after you finish the main quest, the entire game is mirrored — Link becomes right-handed, Kakariko flips to the west of Hyrule Castle, every dungeon is reflected — and every enemy and boss deals double damage. That last change is where this guide stops being optional. On a mirrored, double-damage file, the difference between 11 hearts and 20 hearts with Double Defense is the difference between finishing and not.

More on how the remake diverges in the Ocarina of Time 3D versus N64 breakdown.

Quick Action Checklist

• The maths: 3 starting hearts + 8 boss Heart Containers + 9 from 36 Pieces of Heart = 20.
• 4 Pieces of Heart make one Heart Container. Every piece is worth the same quarter-heart.
• 8 of the 36 sit in Kakariko Village and its Graveyard. Sweep there first if you are behind.
• Plant every Magic Bean as a child — soft soil does not exist in the adult era. Scarecrow's Song is the fallback.
• Get the Golden Scale from the adult fishing record before hunting the deep-water pieces. The Zora's Domain Diving Game's Silver Scale is for Jabu-Jabu's Belly.
• Bombchu Bowling runs a fixed five-prize wheel: 10 Bombchus on the counter means the next game is for the heart. Dampé's Gravedigging Tour pays the heart by the 15th good dig if you stay in the graveyard. Bring Rupees.
• Double Defense from the Great Fairy of Courage beside Ganon's Castle halves all damage — it needs the Golden Gauntlets from inside the castle.
• On Ocarina of Time 3D Master Quest, everything hits for double. Go in with the full bar.